Trump Diverts Extorted Venezuelan Oil Money to a Mystery Account in Qatar, Supposedly for the Country's Own Good

Donald Trump used the U.S. military to raid Venezuela to force its new communist leaders to make a deal in which their oil sales are controlled by him. Now the funds from those sales are being sent through a mystery account in Qatar, and nobody knows exactly who controls it or how the money is being used. Trump claims that this is for the noble purpose to ensure that the funds would flow back to Venezuela itself without facing liens and claims from creditors whom it needs to pay back, which is what would have happened if the funds had been sequestered in a U.S. bank, where they would face transparency regulations.

But, explains CNN:

Trump’s executive order should have prevented the problem of creditors blocking the flow of necessary funds to Venezuela, the expert said. The fact the funds are being held in Qatar not only places it further outside of US legal challenges to that order, it also allows for less US transparency of the movement of cash.

“Unless there’s some public plan that is going to come out and say here’s the government structure for this pot of money, who’s going to have control, here’s the various anti-corruption, anti-money laundering controls that are going to be put in place … this is being set up kind of like a slush fund,” said the expert who asked for anonymity. “It’s very troubling.” …

Some critics of the Trump administration are questioning Trump’s motivation to send the money to Qatar.

“There is no basis in law for a president to set up an offshore account that he controls so that he can sell assets seized by the American military,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat, in a comment to Semafor, which first reported the money going to Qatar. “That is precisely a move that a corrupt politician would be attracted to.”

To cap it off, the sales are being brokered by firms with a history of bribery, who were let off the hook when Trump suspended attempts to rein in corruption by enforcing the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

Trump has been trying to create a source of money he can spend without going through Congress, and now he’s using the U.S. military—which is paid for by the taxpayers, with citizens as volunteers—as muscle to shake down foreign dictators for oil money that is now funneled through another dictatorship to who knows where.

The Executive Watch is a project of the Institute for the Study of Modern Authoritarianism, and its flagship publication The UnPopulist, to track in an ongoing way the abuses of the power of the American presidency. It sorts these abuses into five categories: Personal Grift, Political Corruption, Presidential Retribution, Power Consolidation, and Policy Illegality. Click the category of interest to get an overview of all the abuses under it.

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